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Return to the Hobby 40B

8K views 38 replies 10 participants last post by  shiloh 
#1 ·
Hey everybody, I've been keeping planted tanks for the past few years with decent success. Sadly I had to ditch my tanks when I relocated down to Florida after graduating in August. However, I have not been sitting on my hands all this time; I decided to try my hand at a dart frog vivarium. Here's a look:




Now that I've almost got that project to the point where I want it, I've decided to break back into planted aquaria. The viv really reminded me how much I love putting tanks together. Anyways, now that I've got my own place and a regular paycheck I want to do this aquarium right. Tanks I've had in the past looked okay, but they were essentially just boxes of plants with not much attention paid to planning or layout. Here are the three tanks I had in my college apartment:








The 55g became so overgrown that there was not much room for my angels. Poor guys:




So, now that I have a better idea of what I'm doing, I'd like to get started on a 40 gallon breeder. Add me to the growing list of dollar-per-gallon people. This tank will be in my bedroom so I'm looking for beauty in addition to functionality. Now, ordinarily I'm a huge fan of DIY and I like to think I'm pretty handy but IMO the vast majority of DIY projects don't look very good, no offense to anybody out there. So, where I would normally build my own stand and put together an LED setup, here I have opted for more aesthetic alternatives.


Here are the plans I have loosely hammered out thus far:
I don't plan to have a canopy, so I want to have a glass top and a nice, elegant lighting fixture. I'm a true believer in LEDs and I'm leaning heavily towards the Finnex Ray II.
My filtration will be primarily from a sump that I already have. Additional filtration may come from a canister filter that I also already have should it be necessary.
I'd like to use Eco-complete, at least as a cap. I don't know if I'll use a base yet.
I'm aiming for a medium-maintenance, medium light tank with some ferts, not quite as rigorous as EI, and no CO2.
Driftwood centerpiece, not yet acquired.
My tentative plan for livestock is for a good-sized school of congo tetras.


Now, onto what I've got done so far. I'm the proud owner of a tv-stand turned aquarium stand. This thing is awesome. Not only does it perfectly fit the 40B, but the center shelf area perfectly fits my sump, what are the odds? I think I'll close off the main-shelf with a little black curtain. Also, I've blacked out the back of the tank w/ contact paper left over from the viv.






I'm really excited for this project because I feel like I know what I want and I actually know what I'm doing for the most part.

Thanks for looking and I hope you follow along as this project comes together. I think it will start falling into place pretty quick!
 
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#11 ·
Yeah, it seems like a world of difference from my old tanks. 55 is just not good for planted tanks at all. I like the progress on your 40B by the way, it's looking really good. I especially like the variation in colors you've got.

As for plants, that's a good question. I'm not married to any one idea just yet. Definitely don't want an HC carpet, that just seems really played out. I do like the look of starougyne repens and maybe a small area of microswords. I'm quite fond of mosses but if I get a bitchin piece of wood I don't plan on covering it up.
 
#14 ·
Now that's the million dollar question. Not sure. So you think Morris Bridge Road is worth looking into? Based on when my trip to Hillsborough River State Park in late summer, the area seemed pretty promising. I was thinking about poking around on the Peace River since I've been meaning to kayak down there anyway. It might be easier to find a waterlogged piece if I look near a river or swampy area. I feel like there would be so many good places around here but I don't know where to start.
 
#16 ·
So I found a few pieces of wood today. It was relatively slim pickings but I think I did alright considering. I was hoping for one large centerpiece but today there was nothing that big, unfortunately. I had a certain type of piece in mind but I guess I might just be SOL with the type of trees that grow here. Here's the park I was exploring:





Everything was either rotting or too stick-like. Here's what I got though. I lucked into one piece of cypress knee that wasn't really attached (the big piece). Overall the wood feels pretty good, with good density, but it will likely still float and I'll have to give 'em a good scrubbing. Here's the haul, worst case scenario I can make a scape of these smaller pieces :





Going kayaking tomorrow on the Weeki Wachee, fingers crossed I can find a nice piece, maybe even waterlogged.
 
#17 ·
Putting off looking for more wood until next weekend but did get a jump on the plumbing. In the future I might look into drilling the tank but for now I'm gonna stick with the hang-on-back overflow box. The return was flexible tubing running through a UV sterilizer, which is not operational at the moment, so I decided to add hard-plumbing for the return.

 
#21 ·
My Ray II and heater have arrived! I'm very pleased with the light so far. It's extremely lightweight and very elegantly designed. I must say, I could have built something that put out plenty more light, but it wouldn't look nearly as good. For what it is, and considering it's only 29w, the light output was surprisingly impressive.





Now just waiting on the eco-complete, which should be here tomorrow. Then I can finally get some water in here.
 
#24 ·
Alright, so today was interesting to say the least.

I came home from work to find my Eco-complete waiting, so I got busy getting the tank filled. I used 4 bags of Eco-complete and 2 whole bags of Miracle Gro. I definitely could have gotten away with just 3 bags of the eco-complete. This is where I got into trouble.

The problem is I had initially put the 4th bag aside, thinking I'd save it for another project. The brilliant idea then hit me to dump some of it into my sump so I could grow some stems in there. Though it seems really obvious in retrospect, this wreaked havoc on the utility pump. It repeatedly got clogged with the tiny rocks that kicked up.

Once I kind-of sorted that out, my next headache came once the tank was filled with water. I unplugged the pump for a minute so I could get the siphon started without worrying about the tank overflowing. I completely forgot that I was supposed to drill a new air-hole in the return line. I left the room for a second to get a part and I come back to the sump overflowing. Wasn't as bad as it could've been, but it still made a mess.

It was definitely a frustrating day, and to think I thought stupid rookie mistakes were behind me. Anyways, all the hardware stuff is nearly sorted but not quite. Still on my list to do:

1. Raise overflow weir slightly. It's already as high as it can go, so I'll need to lengthen the notch.
2. Add a standpipe to the overflow box. It's really noisy right now as it is constantly belching air. I'll have to unplug everything at night for the time being so I can sleep.
3. Pump is running a bit loud still, so I need to take it apart and get all the debris out.
4. I think I'd like to add an airstone to the sump just below the bio-balls. This is one of the many reasons I like the idea of a sump, you can keep most of the ugly stuff out of sight. The airstone is to improve dissolved O2 levels and hopefully boost bacteria growth.


So far I'm pleased with the amount of circulation I can get with just the sump. The water's really moving well in the display and I have a feeling the pump is still not at 100% because of debris. If needed I have a very good power head and a 160gph canister standing by. Water is still very cloudy, some organic stuff got stirred up, and the miracle gro layer is belching a lot still.

Despite the problems, I feel pretty good about it overall. Still undecided on how I'm going to cycle, might just throw some endlers in there this weekend.



 
#25 ·
Glad to see ya got water in the 40B!

Don't worry about the mistakes! Everyone makes them, but be glad you were there to keep the flooding to a minimum!!! A little water will flood a LONG WAY!!!! Don't Ask!!! Really clean out the pump!!! Sand or small rock in the impeller chamber can cut into the plastic and cause serious problems!!! Also I usually get some sponge, filter floss, or something soft to put under the main pump to keep the vibration noise from transferring to the cabinet! This will quiet things down allot!

Also the sumps I used to run had a hole drilled pretty close to the bottom of the stack of Bio-Balls on the "pump side" of sump. Then a piece of rigid air tubing was stuck into the bio-ball chamber as close as ya can to the middle of the balls. Then hook up a air pump, it doesn't have to be a big one, to the rigid airline! That's it! It made a very noticeable difference in the speed the bacteria grew to cycle the tank vs. without the extra air!

Anyhoo looking forward to seeing it progress!!!
Drew
 
#27 ·
More good news/bad news unfortunately. I cut the pump out and added an un-welded pvc coupler so it'll be much easier to get at the pump in the future. I also built and added a standpipe to the overflow box, which works like a dream. The drain is completely silent now.



Bad news is that the pump, which wasn't all that quiet to begin with, is now super noisy, even after cleaning it out. It also doesn't start up immediately when I plug it in, you kind of have to knock it against the side to get it going. Sooooo... looks like I'm getting a new pump. I'll probably still come out ahead dollar-wise compared to buying a canister, but this is a pain in the butt.
 
#28 ·
So I finally got the plumbing and everything to the point where I feel comfortable leaving the house or going to sleep without worrying about everything flooding. New pump works great and is much quieter than the old one. I even had to turn the flow down a little bit so that my standpipe will still work properly.


In other news, I think I finally found the wood I'm going to use! It's a pair of cypress knees that I found on a hike today. They are pretty good sized but looking at my tank now, they might need adjustment to fit height-wise. They are relatively slender so I still might use a piece of the wood I collected earlier to fill things out.

It's coming together!

 
#29 ·
Sorry, it's been a while without updates, mostly because not much has gotten done. I finally put the wood in the tank this weekend and got it sinking. I still have to bury it in the soil without kicking up too much Miracle Gro.

The morning after adding the wood I was greeted by lots and lots of nematodes. Is this something I should be worried about? I haven't changed the water at all since adding it and I'm sure a lot of organics have made their way to the water column from the substrate, so I suspect this is the culprit.
 
#30 ·


So, the tops of the wood pieces stick up above the waterline a little bit, even after being buried. I'm still undecided about whether I want to bother changing this or not. I'm leaning towards not because it is a messy process that kicks up a ton of organic debris. My once pristine cap is now covered with detritus from the miracle gro.
 
#31 ·
Alright, so here's my modest beginning. LFS plant selection left a lot to be desired, so looks like I'll be turning to the web. Just threw like $2 worth of minnows in there to cycle. The sump runs great but it's just not possible to get rid of 100% of the noise. I might just end up going with a nice canister once I get my tax refund.

 
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